Fish are so abundant in the ocean (even given how humans overfish, and them often being prey), I kind of wonder
1. Why don’t marine animals converge to a more fish like form? (Aside from say land mammals like whales and dolphines who decided they want to go to the sea)
2. What benefits are there in having a fish-like form in the ocean? It must be evolutionarily advantageous for some reason.
3. Did the first non microscopic multicellular beings have fish-form?
In: Biology
Compare sharks, dolphins, icthyosaur and rockets. These are three distantly related species, two of which spent time on land earlier in their evolutionary history, and a man made object. They all came up with the same body plan for moving quickly through a fluid – rear propulsion, a point at the front, a long sleek body and fins for stability and steering. There are clear advantages to this body type.
Marine animals that aren’t fish form occupy other niches. They may be more passive filter feeders, or occupy the ocean floor, or leave the ocean to lay eggs, or have hundreds of other lifestyles which the fish shape just isn’t suitable for, but for creatures that wasn’t to move quickly through the water, some variation on fish shape is generally the way to go. Hence all the fish.
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